Kulwicki's 1988 Phoenix win much like his career

NASCAR's return to the Valley of the Sun in 1988 for the first time in nearly three decades proved to be a memorable moment in the career of Alan Kulwicki, and the first appearance of a now-familiar post-victory celebration. Kulwicki's win in the 1988 Checker 500 at Phoenix International Raceway would have been considered an upset victory, even without the additional drama.

If anything, Kulwicki proved that perseverance and a positive outlook can overcome almost any set of obstacles.

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First, the car Kulwicki wanted to bring to Phoenix wound up on the back of a wrecker at Rockingham the week before, forcing him to pull out a superspeedway car that had been repaired following an accident earlier in the season to run on the flat, 1-mile oval.

"We tried to come here with an optimistic attitude, but the car we wanted to race here got wrecked at Rockingham," Kulwicki said. "This is the car we wrecked at Charlotte and wanted to run at Atlanta. The car worked well and handled well all weekend, and going into this I felt we were among the five fastest cars."

But starting 21st after spinning out on the first day of qualifying, Kulwicki's day almost immediately turned disastrous when his right-rear tire began losing air pressure as the cars were warming up for the green. Terry Labonte spotted it and gestured toward Kulwicki, who was able to get on pit road and make repairs.

"That was a sportsmanlike gesture," Kulwicki said. "If he hadn't said something, I probably would have lost a lap right away."

Once the race started, Kulwicki methodically worked his way through traffic and took the lead for the first time on Lap 46. But then misfortune would strike yet again with the right-rear tire.

During his second stop, Kulwicki's crew couldn't get one lug nut off the wheel -- and was forced to send him back on the track with three new tires and one that was already blistering.

"Early in the race, I knew I had to run hard to get to the front as quick as I could, but I also had to be careful and stay out of trouble in the traffic," he said. "I was just making some headway when we had a lug nut round off on the second pit stop and I ended up dropping way back again. I nearly lost a lap before the crew got it fixed."

Returning to the track in 21st place, Kulwicki said he tried hard not to think negatively. Instead, he concentrated on not losing a lap to the leaders and prayed for a caution.

"I drove about 25 laps that way and all I could think about was what if they never got it off and I had to drive the rest of the race with that blistered tire," Kulwicki said. "Luckily, we caught a yellow and one of the crew broke it off and got a new tire on."

With that situation fixed, Kulwicki once again knifed his way back through the pack, somehow missing a six-car pileup that took out Mark Martin and Johnny Rutherford. But it appeared all Kulwicki's hard work might go for naught, because Ricky Rudd had dominated up to that point, leading 182 laps.

Still, Kulwicki continued to think positive, and it paid off when Rudd's car suddenly began spewing steam on Lap 297 -- and he turned directly into the garage, the victim of a broken radiator hose.

"It was a radiator hose, and that's disappointing. When I got the lead, the temperature gauge went crazy. I backed off and was running 50 to 60 percent on the straightaways," Rudd said.

From that point, it was just a matter of clicking off the laps -- and hoping bad luck would stay away -- as Kulwicki beat Labonte to the line by 18 seconds for his first Cup victory.

"I'll tell you, with about 20 laps to go, I almost started crying," he said.

In celebration, Kulwicki drove his car backwards down the front straight, much to the pleasure of the 60,000 fans in attendance.

"There will never be another first win, for me or for the track, and I wanted to do something the fans would remember," he said. "I've been thinking about this for a couple of months. Some guys spray champagne, other guys stand on top of their car. I just wanted to be different."

Kulwicki maintained that he might have been able to catch Rudd, even without the mechanical issues.

"We were closing on Ricky and had cut his lead from five seconds down to about three and we thought we had a chance to catch him even if he had not fallen out," Kulwicki said. "No one will ever know if we could, but after all the bad breaks we had all week, we feel like we earned everything we got."

Davey Allison, Bill Elliott and Rusty Wallace completed the top five.

The race foreshadowed what would take place four years later, when Kulwicki would win the 1992 championship in the season-finale at Atlanta by finishing second to Elliott after Allison crashed and was eliminated from contention.

NASCAR's first foray into Arizona came at the Arizona State Fairgrounds dirt mile in 1951. Daytona Beach native Marshall Teague drove one of the Fabulous Hudson Hornets to victory in a 150-lap race. The series returned four years later, as Tim Flock took the win in a Carl Kiekhaefer Chrysler. A year later, it was Buck Baker's turn for Kiekhaefer. And Colorado native John Rostek scored his only NASCAR victory in 1960.

Phoenix International Raceway was completed in 1964 and primarily hosted Indy-car events until NASCAR added the track to the schedule in 1988.

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.